Fun fact: if you approach an employee and insist that they go ‘check the back’ for an item that’s not on the shelf, there is a 90% chance that they’ll go to the back room, scratch their ass and check their text messages for five minutes, and come back out with a sympathetic smile and a ‘Sorry!’ because they know without even looking that the stock isn’t there.

Or the old “can you ask a manager?”

As a retail employee, I can verify that this is 100% accurate.

Yup at Michael Kors and Abercrombie we’d just go in the back chill and talk shit and snack for a bit anytime someone asks for something from the back, managers don’t even care they just laugh

This is quite literally how the bakery at work goes too. We’re not supposed to “fresh bake” anything for a customer if they come in like “Can you bake a ROOLLLLL for me?”
We hop in the cooler, check texts, have other coworkers come in and roll their eyes about this stupid customer, then go out like “Oh darn, all out until tomorrow! :(((“